Xref: utzoo alt.next:227 comp.sys.next:119
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From: bzs@xenna (Barry Shein)
Newsgroups: alt.next,comp.sys.next
Subject: Re: Questions on NeXT machine
Keywords: NeXT
Message-ID: <3952@encore.UUCP>
Date: 22 Oct 88 20:57:37 GMT
References: <17780@glacier.STANFORD.EDU> <[9.5]karl@ddsw1.alt.next>
Sender: news@husc6.harvard.edu
Reply-To: bzs@xenna (Barry Shein)
Followup-To: comp.sys.next
Organization: Encore Computer Corp
Lines: 44
In-reply-to: karl@ddsw1.MCS.COM ([Karl Denninger])

From: karl@ddsw1.MCS.COM ([Karl Denninger])
>With regards to Next machines only being available to colleges:
>
>I hope Jobs comes around to reality soon...
>
>Failing to serve a major market segment that wants to purchase his machine 
>(ie: you and I, folks) is a big, big mistake.  Being arrogant and saying
>"you want one, go to college!" is not the answer.

My guesses are that:

A) The system is tailored to a specific form of University usage more
than meets the eye (eg. the only real purpose of the removeable
optical media is to be able to walk your world around campus and use
any machine, for the rest of us we'd find the disk inadequate in speed
etc as we wouldn't reap the benefits.)

B) He's more or less sold all the machines he expects to be able to
manufacture in the next year or two to commitments from Universities,
so it's a kind of sour grapes comment from him.

C) (More Cynical) He wants to tell you *you* can't have one, people
fall for that kind of stuff.

D) He's projected a marketing and support organization that can only
adequately deal with University environments, such as having them
provide their own service etc. Companies might be able to do this, but
he may have found they are not willing to do this and would rather buy
machines with full, external support. Note that this may not be a
flippant decision, one of the hardest things about getting into the
computer manufacturing business is figuring out, when you're small and
new, how the heck to service that one machine in ColdWater Flats and
not lose your shirt on such systems. This is particularly difficult
with small, inexpensive systems where the margin is tiny. It could
require one full-time person sitting in ole ColdWater waiting for a
phone call, or flying people in when there's a problem. How could you
do that for less than, say, $100K in equipment? Again, return to
factory may be unacceptable in such situations.

I dunno, you might be right, he might be wrong, but I think those
reasons above, if true, (one more comma in this sentence and...)
could belie some motivations which are understandable. (whew!)

	-Barry Shein, ||Encore||